The Nigeria Centre for Disease Control (NCDC), an organisation established in response to the challenges of public health emergencies in Nigeria’s and the Robert Koch Institute (RKI) have signed a joint declaration of intent, to mark the start of a new project to strengthen health security in Nigeria. RKI is Germany’s national public health institute, with a similar mandate as NCDC.

This is coming less than two years after NCDC began to collaborate with RKI, in a project that led to the development of a national training manual for infection prevention control (IPC) in Nigeria. As a follow up to this successful project, NCDC and RKI have expanded their collaboration to include:

*Intensifying surveillance of endemic viral infections of high public health concern

The new Nigeria Centre for Disease Control: Capacity Development for Preparedness and Response for Infectious Diseases (NiCADE) project will involve partnerships with tertiary hospitals, under the coordination of NCDC and with support from RKI. This partnership will include surveillance for Hepatitis E, Rotavirus and AMR.

[L-R] Dr. Joshua Obasanya, Director, Prevention and Programme Coordination, Nigeria Centre for Disease Control (NCDC); Professor Lothar H. Wieler, President, Robert Koch Institute (RKI); signing a joint declaration of intent on the 13th of June 2019 in Abuja, to mark the start of a new project to strengthen health security in Nigeria.

At the event held in Abuja today, the RKI President, Prof. Dr. Lothar H. Wieler, expressed his confidence in the outcomes that this partnership will bring. As national public health institutes of Federal Republics, NCDC and RKI have similar structures that will provide strong learning opportunities for each other.

As part of the project, RKI will provide technical expertise and advice to NCDC, towards strengthening International Health Regulations (IHR) capacity. The partnership between NCDC and RKI is a mutually-beneficial opportunity for national public health institutes to collaborate, towards global health security. It greatly demonstrates the fact that countries are mutually dependent on each other, for health security.

DotunRoy.com is a development driven news website with the overall goal of amplifying, promoting and advocating for positive societal change through Sustainable Development advocacy in line with UN SDGs components such as education, environmental sustainability and Climate Change, Human Rights, health, finance, housing, good governance as well as security in Nigeria and across the world.